


Meeting Your Heroes (Or How To NOT Time-Travel)

by Hightress



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M, Mild Smut, Pining, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Tony-centric
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-27
Updated: 2018-12-27
Packaged: 2019-09-28 18:08:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17187836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hightress/pseuds/Hightress
Summary: Tony tries Time-Travelling. He's not a pro.





	Meeting Your Heroes (Or How To NOT Time-Travel)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ironarm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ironarm/gifts).



> This is for the lovely @ironarm! Sorry this is a bit late but I'm ALSO your secret Santa! What were the odds, right? Hope you'll like this and that you had a wonderful Christmas (and you'll be having an even more beautiful New Year)!

They say you should never meet your heroes. And they are right. Not because they will disappoint you - that would be stupid - but because you'll probably end up being fucked by them senseless. 

 

Hours after, Tony could still remember the feeling of having Steve's hands on him, inside and out, twisting and pulling, leaving marks on every inch of his skin and all over his heart. Not that he would've needed to work that hard to get Tony in the position he got after, ready to comply with anything.

And it hadn't even been a one-time thing. That would've been easier to manage than _this._

This nonsense. This fighting. This separation.

Those hurtful words and choices.

They proved so much. So fucking much. Because it wasn't just hunger what Tony felt towards Steve. And definitely not just admiration. He knew what it was, what the constant squeeze in his chest meant, what his hands wanted to do if only he could have Steve back in his life for a second at least. He refused to say it, to acknowledge it in any way, not even in his own chaotic thoughts.

He would hold him. He would hold him and never let go until their bodies would be crushed together, until their skin pressed into the other's so powerfully and desperately they would become one. 

What he felt wasn't healthy. But again, when did Tony ever care about his own damn health?

He missed Steve. Missed him with every fiber of his being. And that was the only thing that mattered.

Of course, the world had to go to shit in the end and he lost so much that he couldn't bear to lose even more. The simple thought of losing Steve the same way he's just lost the others was maddening. Not that he could help thinking about it. It was like a plague, sticking to him, devouring him, bringing him through that despair closer and closer to his own finale.

But, despite it all, Tony tried pushing all voices in his head telling him to give up, to stop, to mourn what's been lost, as far away as possible. He didn't have the luxury to do any of that, not anymore. Not that he's even been good at dealing with loss anyway.

Work has been the only kind of drug that fuelled him for years. The only one that functioned, that distorted him in a way that was useful. All that bottled up pain got turned into negative energy and his hands started moving, taking apart his suit, the ship, everything he could find in that hellish place, and built one thing after another, not even knowing if any of his ideas might ever function.

He didn't think about Steve as his arms pushed and pulled and almost gave up on Tony. The last thing he did was to dare hope that one day, if he was going to see him again, things were going to be fine between the two of them. Not good, not ok, just fine. There was no point in having expectations, just like there was no point in trying to explain himself to anyone. What mattered, the only thing that mattered, was the future - having one to be precise.

That was what he tried to focus on as he threw away invention after invention, failure after failure, into the huge pile of junk that laid at his feet. He needed that future - not deserved it, that was a different matter entirely - but he needed it. Not for himself, but for the others. The ones that...

It wasn't just about Steve. It really wasn't.

Then why _(Why?)_ when the time came for him to finally come up with a possible solution, a crazy one, that could go wrong in thousands of ways, his mind failed him at last, just as he started to choose a timeline.

Right before the Sakovia Accords would've been ideal. They would've been strong, still a team, still together. Recent enough for things to work. A few months before Thanos came would've been trickier (way too many people to find, maybe not enough time to build a strong defense), but they could've managed it. Even before it all, when the Avengers were first assembled, worked better than what his fingers demanded in a moment of absolute weakness.

When his ambition turned into greed and the idea of loss too much for him to bear. When the idea of deleting all pain became more powerful than any common sense.

Screw all his years of research. He wasn't strong enough to resist this option. After all, selfishness has been his second name for years.

(And self-hatred his third, apparently. Because the time he chose proved it better than anything else.)

He pressed that button, watched a thin, distorted line appear right before his eyes, and touched it, a single finger enough to get him swallowed whole by the glow. And, when he opened his eyes, the first person he saw had been Peggy Carter.

Young, beautiful, brave Peggy Carter. Tony recognized her immediately, the resemblance between the photos he managed to find as a kid in his father's studio and this woman unmistakable. And next to her, a dorky blonde with the bluest eyes Tony has ever seen, stared at her with wonder as if placed in front of a goddess.

When she smiled at him across the table and his cheeks reddened even more, Tony had to move his eyes to the side, incapable to process what was laid in front of him.

Because he knew without a doubt that, despite the oversized clothing, despite his face still filled with hope, despite his unguarded features, that was Steve.

The Steve that he never got to meet.

Even from the opposite side of the room, Tony regretted not preparing himself emotionally for this. Not that years of preparation could've ever made him feel ready enough for a situation of that magnitude. It was one thing to watch Miss Carter, whom he has never known personally, who befriended his dad but never got to meet his family, and another thing entirely to see Steve - someone he loved - like that. So different and yet, as his eyes focused more in a certain point ahead of him, just a few meters away from Tony, so alike.

It didn't feel real. He didn't want it to feel real.

In that moment, leaving would've been the smart choice. The best choice. He only had a button to press, safely hidden in the pocket of his dirty pants. But the button was going to stay right there, untouched, for a long while.

(In a way, he was glad his appearance was so far from his usual attire. With mud covering his whole body, proof of the battle he left in his own time, he didn't look like he was out of place, not entirely. Nobody stared at him twice. And why would they? For them, he was a nobody, he didn't even exist. And maybe that was the point. He chose a moment that he never got to destroy.)

Tony stayed. Knowing the history helped and knowing who to interact with and who to avoid was even better. He didn't want to change the timeline too much, not yet.

After all, those people had completely other monsters to deal with. They wouldn't have cared for a purple alien that was only going to make his move in the next century. Even if he was going to wipe out half of every living organism.

For a while, Tony laid low. Created another identity for himself, bought some spare clothes, whatever fit him. For once in his life, he didn't care for the style. A decent wardrobe wasn't going to help him and sure as hell wasn't going to save the Earth.

That was his mission. To make sure that Thanos' arrival was not going to come as a surprise. They were going to be prepared.

The problem was that Tony never seemed to be able to follow orders properly. Even if they were his own.

Three days into his stay, he saw his dad's picture in a newspaper. Covering the whole front page, of course, damned be that cocky bastard. (Not that Tony didn't see his own face the same way countless times, but he couldn't really control the level of hypocrisy of his thoughts). Of course, he bought it and, of course, he went out of his way to see him.

To see this young, careless, playboy-ish version of his father. The one that everyone still adored.

Why wasn't he surprised when the place he found Howard was a no-name club, right in the middle of New York? And why didn't he even blink when the first live image of his father was with him at the bar, with two gorgeous brunettes on each side of him?

Tony felt like throwing up. He wanted to turn around, press the button and find Steve - his Steve. Which was impossible.

His Steve would punch him. Repeatedly. And, to be honest, he would do the same.

That's why he needed to do this.

"Howard Stark," he addressed his father, choosing a seat next to the girl on his left. If he hadn't been this nervous and the situation this serious, he would've loved to turn the whole thing into a joke, to create a scene or something. To call his old man something exotic to mock him. The way things were, he didn't have the luxury to do any of that.

The only thing he could do was sit still and wait for the right way to do this.

Howard didn't even spare him a glance, too busy trying to charm the thirsty 'babes' next to him. Thirsty for his money, his name, not himself. It was sickening.

"Who's asking?" said Howard, lifting one of his hands from his glass.

_You'd know if you looked, jackass,_ thought Tony, forcing his face to stay still before making a place for that fake picture-perfect grin that the press always found charming. "They call me Anthony."

Such a Hollywood answer. Such a half-truth. Such a plea from a son to his father, unaware of what kind of plea that was.

That made Howard raise his head for a bit, his eyes finally meeting Tony's. There was no recognition there, but for a split moment, Tony feared that possibility.

"Am I not worth your last name, Anthony?"

"I'm sure someone with your background can understand the need to keep some things for myself." Ugh, Tony hated formal talks. He never mastered that art and he surely didn't want to.

Howard's gaze hardened, even if his posture stayed relaxed. "Someone with my background might. Do you have something to discuss?" He paused for a moment, side-eyeing the girls he was with. "Something... Delicate?"

Tony could say many things about his father, but ignorant or stupid would've never made the list. "Extremely," he answered, taking out the envelope he had in his coat enough for Howard to see.

Old-fashioned. Simple. Effective. The letter inside contained all the information Howard needed to know. At the sight of it, Howard understood enough about the direction the conversation was going to go to react accordingly.

Without missing a beat, his smile widened slightly in that cocky manner Tony knew perfectly, and he turned his attention to his 'ladies' fully, excusing himself with two well-executed sentences. Five minutes after that, both of them stood outside, two streets away from the club, dark expressions covering their faces.

"What's inside the envelope?" asked Howard, hands tucked inside the pockets of his pants. However, it wasn't a nonchalant position, but the complete opposite.

"You don't need to know just yet," replied Tony, taking it out. He then proceeded to give him specific instructions about the time - year, month and day - he was supposed to open it. Made it clear just how important the message inside was and how threatening discarding the letter, losing it or opening at any wrong moment was going to be. "And once you're done reading it, give it to your son."

Tony focused so much on this mission, on delivering everything properly, that he overlooked completely the impact that last sentence would have on Howard. The idea of a son brought such an unexpected, genuine and sickeningly pure smile on his face that Tony wanted to punch himself in the face and ask Friday to delete that second from his memory forever.

"A son?" asked Howard disbelievingly, his whole body stiff for the tiniest of nanoseconds before relaxing fully.

For someone like Howard, the idea of settling down should've seemed foreign, right? Tony always thought so, even when their family was still in their honeymoon phase, but that reaction made him question that belief. Howard's face betrayed eagerness and Tony had no idea how to deal with that.

"Just an assumption, obviously," he said, but, judging by the look Howard gave him, it seemed clear enough there was no fooling his father.

He never mentioned the future either, and yet, he had the impression his father understood more than he was letting on. That and the fact that he kept watching Tony way too closely for his comfort. Which wasn't much, to begin with.

Tony could've said more before he left. Way more. Could've done something to prevent his parent's death, a single sentence would've been enough, he knew. But there were way too many equations implicated in that event to risk it.

He turned around after a few minutes, each step heavier than the last, each centimeter making him feel more and more like he had sentenced his own parents to death before he was even born.

His job was done. He delivered the message. It Howard did his job accordingly, the path of the future should've already been different.

But Tony didn't feel like going anywhere just yet. Fear was a real thing, and Tony didn't consider himself brave enough to press the button and deal with the consequences of his actions just yet. And definitely didn't want to risk returning to an Earth just as damaged as the one he had left. Just as tragic.

He couldn't risk going back there and still not having Steve and any of the people he had failed.

Steve... He wasn't that out of reach just yet. He was close to Tony at _that_ time, that place. Might not have been Captain America, might not be able to lift a car, lead an army just yet, but Tony never loved those sides. He loved Steve Rogers, the stubborn bastard that never stopped fighting, his will to stay still and push back, his fire, those understanding eyes that could read him in seconds, even when Tony didn't want to be read. He loved the core, not the suit. And he knew that all of those lived inside the Steve of this time.

Tony wanted to see that for himself. He wanted to go and try out his luck, take this as a second chance to make things right.

He wanted to fall in love with Steve all over again, with every part or version of him.

It had nothing to do with lust. But it had everything to do with that still unstoppable ache in his chest.

The button inside his pocket had to wait for a bit longer. Not for too long, just enough for Tony to allow himself to be selfish one more time. He'd be back, he knew, and once he did, he'd deal with everything that had to be done.

But not yet.

 

 

 

They say you should never meet your heroes. And they are right. Not because they will disappoint you - but because you might risk the future of the universe just to be with them a bit longer.

**Author's Note:**

> you can find me on Tumblr as @hightress


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